Monday, October 19, 2009

"Economics 101: For Dummies Like Me... "

(Originally posted on my FB site March 26, 2009)

Okay, so, say I come home today and find out that not only have I lost my job, but I am also 40 thousand dollars in debt, and 50 of the several thousand criminals released from our Prison System recently (due to over crowding and not enough funding) have all moved into my already insecure neighborhood. Additionally, taxes are out of control and consumer prices are off the hook. This is not great news, not at all. I need to figure out how I am going to get by, how will I live and support myself. I need incentive – a stimulus of some sort. I need my confidence boosted! I then get a bright idea how best to right these wrongs and take the following immediate actions.

I grab my 10 remaining credit cards and head out the door because I need to make some key investments. I return home having purchased a new car, a contract for a swimming pool and hot tub to be installed, all the clothes and accessories I have been eyeing for weeks, electronic toys of the latest and greatest lines, and a lot of other things I have wanted for years but could never get. I max out my cards while filling up on all my hearts desires because I have decided that I just can’t stand it anymore the not having them. Hey, you only live once and I am not getting any younger! This reminds me, I need to call and hire myself a private trainer to whip my hot bod back into shape – after I have all the cosmetic surgeries necessary to expedite my progress. I have figured out a way to help pay for some of my stimulus spending by eliminating some of the things in which I used to invest because I no longer see them as a priority. First to go is my top of the line home security system that has kept me safe all of these years. After all, nothing bad will REALLY happen to me the way it has for several of my other neighbors. I don’t have children to molest and I don’t dress in a way to invite any of the rapists to my home. In fact, if I get rid of my Gardener and let my house go to pot, no one will know I have all of these wonderful goodies inside to rob. Nah, I have been safe and I refuse to live in the fear that my neighbors live in. I have more faith than that! I don’t know how I am going to pay my bills but I have hope! And now I have change too! I have gotten straight my priorities and everyone loves me more because I have. You know, it just occurred to me that with deferment payment plans, my nieces and nephews along with their kids can pay my bills long after I am gone. After all I have done for them; it is the least they can do for me in kind. Yes, this is the most common sense plan of all; run up my debt further, cut personal security spending (after all, after going line by line, this is one area that really isn’t working anymore and therefore, not needed), and whatever remains of my debt by the time I pass away, I will defer to my relatives (for at least a few generations) to pay in full. You know if we all do this, our lives will get moving again as usual and we will all be happy. Time to get busy on my plan!

Back to reality now: Does any of this make sense to YOU? In all truth, would ANY of us do this in real life? REALLY? Is this how you would respond to the crisis? Not only “no” but HELL NO!! Our instinctive reaction is to begin to do just the opposite – cut back, make sacrifices both for the “extras” we currently enjoy and the things we want to get. Further, if you are like me, you begin sacrificing some of the things you NEED, prioritizing them and making some difficult choices. You begin to scrimp and save for whatever you may need in the future because that is the part that is so uncertain. Additionally, this uncertainty, along with the new “neighbors,” creates a greater insecurity about safety and the need to shore up your security systems.

With taxes being cut and consumer prices dropping as is the normal part of the process of popping “bubbles” of the economy (It is called a “reboot” just like you do with a freezing computer; all things must cycle back to a starting base. If you do not allow that to happen with a reboot, you just further clog the system and prolong the cycle of freezing intervals – like a catch-22, or a dog chasing his tail which he will never catch. It will just keep circling around like a tornado picking up more speed and debris with each go ‘round.), this provides a little bit of relief and helps me afford my essentials. It also gives me a real hope that things will turn around at some point just up ahead, and finding a new job will come. Like the 4 Seasons, this is the natural cycle of our “Capitalist Economy,” a cycle which experts have established takes about 80 years to complete. (Glenn Beck has one of these experts on his show frequently, I believe his name is Walt Zimmerman, who explains this exactly like the 4 Seasons, and even how each Season has its own characteristics – all normal.)

Part of what happens in this Winter Season is, bubbles pop, failing Companies either end or reboot through Chapter 11 Bankruptcy for which it was created to do to help out these Companies that actually have a hope of re-birth, and new innovation springs forth from failure. It is the natural order of winter. Things die. They go dormant. We prune away the things that die and often use it as the very compost that nurtures the seeds of new life. This happens with the knowledge and real hope of spring coming on its heels once the process of winter completes its work. Every Season has a purpose – every Season has an up and a down, just like a roller coaster. Seasons rise and then they fall in transition for the next coming Season. God was so smart in how He designed our world. It even says in the Bible that, “Unless a seed falls to the ground and dies, it cannot bear forth any fruit.” Our Founding Father’s gleaned from and leaned on His wisdom to establish our Capitalist System, which is the most successful and prosperous in the entire world. It is when we deviate from it, like driving off the freeway where no exit exists, that we invite trouble.

And now we are courting the trouble of a Socialist System that many Countries in the world have already PROVEN do not work!! Did anyone catch the European Cabinet Member telling off Gordon Brown the other day? Well, he was all over Fox News yesterday explaining how we are heading for disaster! The Socialist System they have had for the last 10 years is killing their Country. Further, there was a caller on the Sean Hannity Radio Show on the same day who said she came here to America to escape Socialism. She said she is alarmed at what President Obama is doing to America and sees the signs of the beginning of Dictatorship. She is really frightened. Yesterday, on Mark Levin’s Radio Show, a Conservative from Canada called to talk about the TRUTH of Universal Health Care (of which I have heard the same stories from my own personal friends both in Canada and England) and trust me; you will be praying to return to what we have now. If you hate the DMV, you will hate Universal Health Care.

With common sense in how we conduct our own lives, the proven failure of Socialism in other Countries, and the testimony of those who have lived this life and thus, came to America to escape it, why does President Obama think his “Plan,” (which is symbolically similar to my little scenario, and a plan which is not anything new or the change we need), will somehow magically work because he says so? Why do many Americans still support these changes? Of course it is exciting to them because it is something new to them, new to America, and something they have no clue about. And of course, as I highlighted yesterday, the Salesman and Lawyer in Obama, who parses words better than the inventor, Bill Clinton, people only hear the “sales pitch” version but they never hear the truth – a truth that if put into action will ruin this Country. We think we can’t afford much right now because of the economy…. Well, our Country cannot afford the ruinous “Plan” of our beloved President Obama.

The truth is so basic, logical, and common sense. And we are intelligent enough to figure it out for ourselves! We don’t need a Degree and we don’t need to understand all the other “intricacies” of Economics to figure this out. We just need to go back to the foundations, we just need to reboot. We need to allow the “Seasons” of the economy do their work and allow the winter to serve its purpose. I for one love winter time but I am not fond of the idea of living in a perpetual winter. Eventually, I become ready for the joy of spring to come. But unless the seeds fall to the ground and die, unless we prune what has died creating the compost for the seeds, and unless we go back to the foundations and begin building again, winter will be here to stay and in ways many have yet to figure out.

I have always had this thing about me that I smell smoke long before anyone even sees it, let alone the fire it comes from. It is a challenge to remember that I have to live in real time because others might think I am a bit out to lunch. “Seers” were never popular even in Biblical days. Even when Noah was building the Arc to prepare for rain and flood, a concept that never before occurred on the earth and thus they didn’t even know what it was, others thought Noah was coo-coo; he even questioned himself. In the end, he and family survived by listening and HEARING, and all the mockers perished. In recent days I have been coming to terms that my sounding the warning is never going to be popular. I have to love enough to put my ego aside, and put aside my own need for unconditional love and acceptance, and sound the alarm. Love compels me. Sniff, sniff…. What is that? Wow, guess what? I smell smoke….

About Me

Take the journey with me in navigating single life. While this Blog will read like a journal, it is designed to become interactive. And even though the focus is as titled, for "single ladies," men are not excluded from this ongoing conversation. Hoping we all can learn from each other, encourage one another, and grow together.